In my travels for the Register, I've visited scores of churches, shrines and pilgrimage sites.

All have left their mark on me, but when I came to this one, just two miles from downtown Boston, I was so in awe I couldn't help but drop to my knees.

Maybe the timing had a little something to do with it: The Diocese of Boston is going through one of the most trying chapters in its history right now. If ever the faithful of Massachusetts needed the Blessed Mother's intercession under her TITLE “Our Lady of Perpetual Help,” it's now.

Be that as it may, this is one glorious sign of God's grace at work on earth, and has been such for more than a century. Well before Our Lady of Perpetual Help became New England's first basilica on Dec. 8, 1954, the last day of a Marian year and the 100th anniversary of the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, it was already renowned across the country because of miraculous healings connected with it.

These began before this massive, 215-foot-long church was built from a local quarry's puddingstone and dedicated on April 7, 1878. It replaced the original wooden church that the Redemptorists had established as a mission to scores of German immigrants living and working in this section of town, Roxbury.

That's how the popular second name of the church — “Mission Church” — originated. (Ask any lifelong Bostonian where the Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help is and you may draw a blank stare; ask where Mission Church is and you'll quickly be on your way there.) Shortly after the mission was founded, the mystical icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help was solemnly enthroned on Pentecost Sunday, 1871, above the old church's altar.

Redemptorist Resplendence

That started a long succession of miraculous cures that have gone on for 131 years — close to 50,000 consecutive days without a breather. The cures of illnesses that specialists branded incurable were so widespread by the turn of the 20th century that newspapers around the nation were calling the church a “Lourdes in the Land of the Pilgrims.”

By then, readers had learned of Grace Hanley, a girl crippled in an accident. After she and her family made several novenas at the church's shrine, she was healed. Her cure drew wide attention because her father was a well-known Civil War officer who for years had taken her to many doctors, none of whom could help.

To this day we know of the family's unending thanks. By the magnificent shrine chapel of Our Lady of Perpetual Help, two huge metal vases hold neatly arranged geysers of crutches and canes left by those cured. On one, the family donated a plaque that reads, “Miss Grace Hanley/cured Aug. 18, 1883.”

From the beginning, the shrine and icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help made Mission Church a spiritual beacon that summoned souls from near and far. In pre-high-rise days, the church's 215-foot-tall twin steeples could be seen from across the city. They were prominent landmarks for the thousands who filled the eight Wednesday novena services to overflowing. Redemptorist Father Joseph Manton, who lived in the rec-tory for 56 years and died here in 1998, directed these novenas.

The entire interior is a dazzling treasury of jewels. Four years ago, I saw the basilica as a rare beauty. But on my recent visit, after last year's major restoration, which returned the basilica to its pristine original condition, I thought I was given a glimpse of heaven's reception room.

Marble sparkles throughout, but especially in the intricately carved details of the towering white Carrara marble main altar — the focal point of the church's seven altars. This seems to glisten like an ice sculpture in no danger of melting.

Massive as it is, this high Gothic altar, with its tabernacles and spires, has a lace-like gracefulness. The Redemptorists enshrined a statue of Our Lady of Sorrows over the main tabernacle. Why? Because Our Lady of Perpetual Help is only represented as a painting, never in statue form, and Our Lady of Sorrows is thought to have the closest resemblance. To Mary's side, Carrara images of St. Michael and St. Gabriel accompany her, while two charismatic angels with wings outspread stand on the reredos, sounding their trumpets.

This inspiring beauty is but part of the basilica's perfectly orchestrated celestial symphony of statues, paintings, mosaics and marbles. The nearest side altars honor the Sacred Heart, St. Joseph, the Holy Family and St. Patrick — all in resplendent, larger-than-life mosaics of German design realized in fire-treated glass. At the St. Joseph altar, the strong family resemblance in the features of adoptive father and young son Jesus gave me extra pause for reflection.

Matter-of-Fact Miracles

The right transept's monumental Purgatorian altar pictures angels hovering near Jesus Crucified, escorting souls to heaven and guarding the tabernacle. Angels appear everywhere, even carved into the Corinthian capitals of marble columns along with the lion and ox. One huge angel shimmering in blue mosaic and another in pink hold a banner announcing “Ave Maria” above the majestic Shrine Chapel of Our Lady of Perpetual Help that fills the left transept.

Here the eye is first to the miraculous icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help. She and the Child Jesus are enthroned above the tabernacle in awe-inspiring majesty within a dazzling golden frame of bursting sun-rays and cherub faces. Around Our Lady, the shining gold mosaic wall and dome radiate splendor and warmth.

The shrine is a visual canticle singing of Mary and Jesus who are so majestic, yet so approachable. Mary's basilica brings this out, too. Even with its size, it glows with the warmth of Mary's motherly protection and concern.

I thought of it as part of Mary's mantle enfolding us in a mother's love. No wonder so many miraculous cures, from spiritual to physical, originate here.

The reminder of Mary's intercession for restoration to health and redemption continues in a brilliant mural filling the soaring cupola. Victorious Christ the Redeemer (symbol of the Redemptorists) is the center; Mary as Queen of Heaven is right by him. She's surrounded by petitioning crowds that include a woman holding her child toward Mary and by the Redemptorist saints.

One group of three priests and a nun is unique because one is Father Manton and another is Redemptorist Father Edward McDonough — who is very much alive and, indeed, nationally known. He has conducted healing services here every last Sunday of the month for over 26 years now.

As if the visual hymn emanating from every nook and cranny of this magnificent house of God weren't enough, Mission Church augments it with an 1897 Hutchings Organ, 3,100 pipes strong, built in Boston. Recently restored, it spans the nave to fill the choir loft.

I have no doubt that the Archdiocese of Boston will emerge from its present trials even stronger than it was before they began, thanks to the prayers seeking the Blessed Mother's intercession from this beautiful and holy basilica.

Joseph Pronechen writes from Trumbull, Connecticut.